ASUS P8P67 Review
by Brendan van Varik on September 8, 2011 10:45 AM EST- Posted in
- Asus
- Motherboards
- P67
Today, we will be looking at the ASUS P8P67. Although the board has been available for some time, this is one of ASUS' cheaper full size ATX offerings. Considering it has a price tag of $155 ($140 with rebate), it offers quite a few useful features such as DIGI+ VRM, BT GO! (Bluetooth), a total of four USB 3.0 ports, and Quad-GPU CrossFireX support.
Even though the P8P67 does not offer as many features as the more expensive models in this range, or even some of the optional extras in the box which other boards come with in the same price range, it does perform better than you may have initially thought. The biggest complaint we have is the second PCIe x16 slot only operates in x4 mode, which does impact multi-GPU performance. The board's power consumption is also higher than other motherboards we have tested. Overall, I would say this motherboard is a good contender in the sub $160 price range but some of the additional extras which come with the ASRock P67 Extreme4 for example may be enough to sway people towards that board instead.
Visual Inspection
ASUS has decided to go with a blue and black color scheme, which is built upon a black PCB. The black and blue theme carries its way throughout the motherboard on to the expansion slots, RAM slots and the heat sinks as well.
Just like all of the latest ASUS range, their latest TPU (TurboV Processing Unit) and EPU (Energy Processing Unit) processors are on this motherboard. The EPU chip is designed to analyze the actual CPU loading and dynamically regulate the various system power saving and performance parameters in real time. By doing this, it creates an optimal energy saving configuration. The TPU takes care of the system performance - it automatically raises the systems clocks to provide the extra grunt whenever it is required and it also relieves parts of process-intensive tasks from the CPU.
Just like most motherboard manufacturers of the modern age, ASUS has designed the slot layout fairly well. With a GPU, or even two, you will still have a PCIe x1 slot available. They have also allowed for a two slot gap under the GPU which will allow the top card to breathe a little better when using a dual GPU configuration. Unfortunately, you will only be able to use one PCIe x1 slot when you have a dual slot graphics cards.
The P8P67 has a total of four SATA 6 Gbps connections available; however only two of them allow for a RAID array. The navy blue ports, which are on the Marvell controller, do not have RAID support whereas the gray PCH ports feature RAID 0, 1, 5 and 10. The four light blue ports are SATA 3 Gbps.
There are a total of four fan headers on the P8P67 and they are in what I would consider good locations. The CPU header is located above the socket, toward the top of the motherboard. There is another one labeled PWR_FAN; it is located just above the MemOK! button. To finish it off, there are two case fan connections, one of which is to the left of the CPU socket and the other one is located just above the front panel connections.
The back panel contains two PS/2 connectors, a SPDIF output, a total of six USB 2.0 and two USB 3.0 ports. A Firewire port is included as well as the built-in Bluetooth. To finish off, there is a single gigabit Ethernet port and the typical audio jacks.
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Blaster1618 - Thursday, September 8, 2011 - link
I am so tired of LGA-1155 being portrayed as an "Enthusiast Board"-Dual-channel memory.
-Narrow PCI Bus.
-Virtually fixed core clock.
-and the stake to the heart....on board graphics.
Wait...wait LGA-2011 and i7 3-series will spice up the M-board review business.
zero2dash - Thursday, September 8, 2011 - link
Troll much?Onboard graphics has no performance penalty on a 2600K (let alone a 2500K) so throw that piss poor reason out the window.
Narrow PCI bus? Yes, because that's clearly dragging SB systems through the mud. So is the dual channel memory.
Fixed core clock? Who gives a crap? Yeah, because a locked core clock with an unlocked multiplier is a worse option than an unlocked core clock and a limited amount of multiplier options.
Have fun paying for those quad channel ram kits.
A5 - Thursday, September 8, 2011 - link
A) Memory bandwidth has very little discernible effect on non-benchmark applications. Modern CPUs are so good at cache management that there is almost 0 reason to chase memory bandwidth. Ironically, the 1156 CPUs probably need the bandwidth more (due to the onboard graphics) than the 2011 CPUs will.B) If you need more than two PCI-e x8 slots, then you're the kind of person who will drop the cash on LGA-2011 anyway. This is a legit knock against P67 and Z68, but it also only affects the hardcore enthusiasts, the top 1% of the top 1% who are running 3 or 4 GPUs.
C) LGA-2011 is going to have fixed clocks too. With multipliers unlocked, this is kind of a moot point anyway.
D) Considering P67 doesn't even allow you to use the onboard graphics, I don't see how this is a valid complaint.
I think P67 is a perfectly acceptable "enthusiast" product, and honestly I'd be surprised if there is an LGA-2011 version of Ivy Bridge outside of the server space.
RussianSensation - Thursday, September 8, 2011 - link
You should leave him alone :)He is probably going to future-proof his LGA-2011 setup with 32GB (4x8GB) for $1200:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...
....because 32GBs in Quad-Channel LGA2011 Pawwwwwwwns all!
Blaster1618 - Saturday, September 10, 2011 - link
Not Hating... but I figured as soon as the Z series board was out, the H&P series boards would drop, rightfully so, in the bargain bin.I obvious to me that the 2nd generation i7 have an internal memory architecture limitation. (ie they were not designed for enthusiasts) Cut and paste old North Bridge architecture on the die. The bandwidth(bitwidth) of the internal communication 3rd generation chips is nearly twice the 2nd generation and it has 20 Gbit DMI 2.0.
If you don't believe bandwidth matters, I have a bin full old 64 bit Geforce cards for sale. I play games on my X-box, My computers for Solid modeling and Finite element analysis and surfing pron.
I was under the understanding the issues with the base clock adjust-ability were issues with the on board GPU's sensitivity to frequency. I am hoping the base clock on the I7 3820 will have 30-40% overclock like the LGA1366 or my old E6600.
At <$300 the i7 3820 should be quite a deal ps my business picks up the $1,200 for the 32 GB of Corsair XMS.
RussianSensation - Thursday, September 8, 2011 - link
2500k - $220This board - $135
vs. i7-990X
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core-...
Care to explain how a $355 mobo+cpu setup trades blows with an overclocked $999 i7 CPU on "enthusiast" LGA1366?
I hope you enjoy your $300 LGA2011 Motherboard + $500-1000 CPU for 1 quarter until IVB launches and obsoletes LGA2011 for anyone but workstation users.
Etern205 - Friday, September 9, 2011 - link
pfff....Yep, have fun waiting for that Ivy Bridge of yours....
http://vr-zone.com/articles/the-upgrade-path-to-iv...
CharonPDX - Thursday, September 8, 2011 - link
If you've used any Intel Desktop Board in the past three years, you've used a UEFI-based configuration utility. It's just one designed to look like an old fashioned 'BIOS' screen. (P.S., technically it hasn't been a "BIOS" in a while, it's been a configuration utility.)Concillian - Thursday, September 8, 2011 - link
So why is the P8P67 consuming 20 more watts at idle than the P8P67 Pro in it's review?Shouldn't the less featured board be using less power?
Mumrik - Thursday, September 8, 2011 - link
I looked around for a relatively cheap motherboard with 8+ SATA ports for a 2500k and this board was by far the cheapest. Reading up in forums (especially at the [H] where Asus is active) and at Newegg I got the impression that there was an unusual amount of problems with the generation of Asus boards, so I chickened out and picked up an Asrock instead.